The Highest Paid Female CEOs Make Less Than Half Of The Highest Paid Male CEOs

What gender-based wage gap? Let's call it what it is: a wage gulf. A new analysis reveals that the difference in the pay between men and women is not only systemic, it's huge — especially at the senior executive level.

According to an analysis of executive pay by the Wall Street Journal, the highest-paid female CEO made less than half of what the highest-paid male CEO made.

The survey compared the salaries of TJX, the company that owns T.J. Max and HomeGoods, CEO Carol Meyrowitz, who was the highest-paid woman with a compensation package of $20.6 million. The top-paid male executive was Lawrence Ellison of Oracle, who earned a reported $76.9 million.

Looking at these two figures, Ellison makes more than three and a half times more than what Meyrowitz brings in each year.

A comparison of the pay that male and female CEOs receive is inherently problematic, however, because there's so little data to draw from — it's no secret that women are underrepresented as company leaders, and just 14 of the Fortune 300 CEOs whose salaries were studied by the WSJ were female.

Still, the disparity between the numbers is troubling, especially since all data points to the fact that businesses helmed by females are more profitable overall.